Flagship
by Bellmason
Summary: Set in the 'Lost Era' between TOS and TNG, Flagship follows the exploits of Captain Rachel Garrett and the crew of the Enterprise-C. Nine years before the famous battle of Narendra III Capt. Garrett is still trying to come to terms with her new command and is haunted by the fate of the previous Enterprise. Featuring tie-ins with several TNG episodes and characters.
1. Part I

**Part I: HISTORY NEVER FORGETS**

 **2329 - The Kitnor**

1.

The Enterprise veered left and the inertial compensators finally gave out. Everyone on the bridge of the Enterprise-B was flung violently in the opposite direction and Captain Merdin Lury was almost thrown from the command chair.

"That's it, no further," he said to himself, but with all the noise and confusion around him, none of his crew heard. "Helm, all-stop. Number One, give the order to abandon ship."

"Helm not responding sir," shouted Ronson, clambering back into his seat in front of the helm controls, "but the impulse engines are out again anyway."

The ship was now rolling uncontrollably and the yaw couldn't be stopped without the reaction control system, which had stopped working an hour before, just after they had entered the nebula.

"Sir, without stabilising the ship it's going to be almost impossible to launch a shuttle," warned Commander Egan.

"Don't worry," said Lury, we've got the best helmsman in the fleet haven't we?" He smiled in the direction of Lieutenant Commander Ronson, but he knew he as asking a great deal. That had always been the way of things aboard the Enterprise. Everything he'd ever asked of his crew always just happened, without question and beyond his highest expectations. Even after thirteen years in command of the Enterprise-B, they could still surprise him.

They could feel the push of true physics now, without the artificial gravity field and stabilsers that they normally lived with every day. The Enterprise was starting to rotate about two axis simultaneously.

"All remaining crew waiting aboard the shuttlecraft sir, but I don't think we should keep them waiting for too long," said Egan.

"There's one more thing we have to do." All it needed was a glance at Egan and the Second Officer R'ulleth for them to know what he meant. "Computer, initiate auto-destruct sequence. Authorisation Lury-Alpha-Alpha-One-Alpha," but there was no response from the computer.

"Off-line, Looks like we lost the option to self-destruct as well," said Egan.

"Secondary auto-destruct?" Asked Lury. Egan looked at the display screens in front of him and shook his head.

"We don't even have enough anti-matter on board to rig an explosion, we dumped it all when we ejected the reactor core."

"Well it's a big nebula," said Lury, "just have to hope the right people find the ship first." The Captain hauled himself over to the communications panel with some difficulty and checked the coded signal he'd set up one last time. Then he set it to send out a brief burst and shut down. The other two officers made for the access ladder and Lury entered the Jefferies tube behind them.

"Goodbye old friend," said Lury, clamping the door shut behind him with the manual controls and making his way down to the escape shuttle.

 **Four Years Later**

2.

Captain Rachel Garrett stared at the portrait hanging on the wall of the observation lounge. It was an oil painting of Captain Merdin Lury, her predecessor. The great lineage of Enterprise Captains were here from Jonathan Archer, to Robert April, Christopher Pike and James T. Kirk and on to John B. Harriman, Demora Sulu and finally Lury. It was a lineage that Garrett was now a part of, she realised. She stared up at the last portrait, Lury. While the others were mere names in Starfleet history or characters out of a holo-vid recording, Merdin Lury was someone she had known, if only a little. They had not been close friends, but they had met when he'd visited the Federation Embassy on Qo'nos, when Garrett had served as the Starfleet Liaison to the High Council. They spent a pleasant evening at a reception for the crew of the Enterprise-B and afterwards had kept in touch through a series of long and rambling discussions about all kinds of subjects.

Garrett felt the shock as keenly as anyone when the news came that the Enterprise-B had been lost. For a good while the whole Federation had been in shock, more so for the fact that, for the first time in its history, the United Federation of Planets had almost no active enemies. The Klingons, though not entirely at peace, had not been at war with them for forty years and some in the Federation believed they were well on their way to forming an alliance. The Romulans had been huddled in self-imposed isolation for the last twenty-five years, since the Tomed incident.

Probably the hardest thing to take though was the lack of closure. There was no wreckage, no bodies and no definitive account of what had happened. A shroud of mystery surrounded the incident and Starfleet Intelligence had classified all of the reports concerning the Enterprise-B's loss at the highest security levels, leaving only rumours and speculation to flourish. Nobody really seemed to know for sure whether the crew of the Enterprise were alive or dead. The plaque under Lury's portrait merely stated that he was MIA. The inevitable replacement had been hastily prepared, from a pre-existing hull of the latest and most advanced class the fleet could produce. The new Enterprise NCC-1701-C had been commissioned in 2332, just three years after the disappearance of Lury and his ship.

'Missing in Action', Garrett mused. She had pulled virtually every favour she was owed to get more information, but no one knew anything. Everyone told her to forget it, to put the past behind her. For a while she had listened to them, but the nagging doubts had never quite gone away. Then, three hours ago they had come back stronger than ever when her Communications Officer had informed her of an incoming code forty-seven transmission.

This unusual high level security procedure prohibited a record of the communication being noted in any log, or even stored in the ship's computer. The transmission contained a set of co-ordinates and list of very specific security requirements. There was no indication of who had sent it, only that its source used an authentic Starfleet protocol. To Captain Garrett it had Starfleet Intelligence's nasty fingerprints all over it.

A call from her First Officer snapped the Captain from her reverie.

"Captain, we're picking up a ship on long-range sensors. It's approaching our position at warp nine." Garrett stepped through the connecting door from the observation lounge and back onto the bridge to see an expectant Commander McLeran looking back at her. "It's the Uss Ambassador," he said, walking to the aft stations. Garrett settled into the Captain's chair.

"Have the transporter room standing by."

The blue-white flash of a warp field disengaging was followed by the elongated outline of a ship returning to sub-light speed. The Ambassador immediately went into a tight starboard turn and sideslipped for a few hundred metres, making a one-eighty turn. Then the impulse engines fired to null its rate.

"They're launching a shuttle," McLeran reported.

"Notify the main shuttle bay to clear all personnel," Garrett ordered. She looked around for an officer who was of a sufficient rank for the task she had in mind, but who she wouldn't miss for a while. Her eyes settled on the young Lieutenant sitting at the helm controls. "Lieutenant, go down and meet them."

"Sir," Lieutenant Castillo replied smartly, and walked over to the turbolift.

Captain Garrett looked back at the viewscreen. Less than a minute after dropping out of warp, the Ambassador was re-engaging its warp engines. The tiny shuttlecraft that had emerged from the rear of the ship was making good headway and was barely clear of the nacelles when the Ambassador lurched forward and stretched away into warp. The shuttle was buffeted around in the wake of the dissipating warp field but managed to stay on course.

3.

For Richard Castillo the trip to the shuttle bay was a welcome break from the dull routine of the bridge, even if it did mean watching his manners with some high ranking official. Castillo had hoped that life aboard the Enterprise would be as exciting as the name suggested, but so far things had been slow and uneventful. The only things that had happened since he came aboard three months ago involved seemingly endless crew re-assignments. Since Garrett had taken command of the Enterprise almost a year ago, the ship had been through three first officers and each time the senior staff had all had to re-adjust and try to build a good working relationship.

Nobody, as far as he knew, got along with Rachel Garrett. McLeran, the latest executive officer, was trying his best, but the Captain was distant somehow, preoccupied with something. It was as though nothing anybody did was good enough. Everyone knew what it meant to serve on the Enterprise, how it was supposed to be this great honour and she was the best of the best. Everyone felt the pressure to perform at the top of their game, but everybody handled that pressure differently. That must also be true of Captain Garrett, thought Castillo. Maybe she felt that pressure even more than any of them. He just hoped that once the Enterprise and her crew was given a real mission, rather than shakedowns, trials and training exercises, it would all come together.

The crew of the shuttle bay were waiting in the corridor outside when Castillo arrived, as per the Captain's orders. None of them dared to ask Castillo what this was all about. Castillo dismissed them and they all got into the turbolift he'd just arrived in. He keyed in his security clearance to open the door and entered the shuttle bay.

The flight deck took up most of the ship's aft section, which was almost three decks high. The clamshell doors covered the whole of one end of the hangar. Castillo went over to the control booth and turned on the force field which sealed the deck so that the giant doors could open. They slid apart, revealing a stunning panorama of stars beyond. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness he could just make out the blinking lights on the approaching shuttle, but noticed on the monitor that it was being brought in on manual. The shuttlecraft came in briskly, but well under control. It dropped smoothly onto the deck without any help from the auto-docking system. Castillo could see its two occupants seated in the front. One was a young woman, a Human, and the other was a much older Vulcan male. He set the main doors to close again and left the booth to greet the new arrivals.

As he approached he could see there was something unusual about the shuttle. The basic design was of a standard type six, but it had been heavily modified. There were extra pods on the sides, and some sort of module attached to the roof. He read the name on the side, 'Shuttlecraft Turing', but there was no accompanying starship designation, meaning it wasn't part of the Uss Ambassador's complement.

The side door slid open and two small steps emerged from the lower hull. The female officer got out and extended a hand toward Castillo.

"Lieutenant Marta Batanides reporting," she announced. "I'm Commodore Varen's aide. Permission to come aboard." Castillo could see no good reason to refuse them.

"Permission granted," he smiled. "The Captain's waiting for you both on the Bridge." He glimpsed the Commodore inside the shuttle and stopped smiling, suddenly aware that, despite the young woman's casual greeting, he probably should adopt a more formal bearing. Batanides was only one rank above him, a full Lieutenant to Castillo's Junior Grade, which made him feel a little more comfortable. Batanides moved aside and the Vulcan Commodore made his way down the steps. Castillo stood to attention but the Vulcan failed to give any kind of acknowledgement. He simply walked towards the exit, leaving Batanides and Castillo to trail behind.

Vulcans had no concept of 'small-talk', Castillo quickly realised, which made the relatively long turbolift journey back up to the Bridge seem a lot longer than it was. Among the lower decks, where Castillo spent a good portion of his time, conversation was free and informal, so it was hard for him to hold back from asking Commodore Varen about his journey here, or his mission. It seemed equally inappropriate to start chatting to his aide, Batanides and so the awkward silence was not broken until the doors opened and Castillo had presented the new arrivals to the Captain.

4.

"Commodore on the Bridge," called the First Officer on seeing the Vulcan. Varen needed no introductions with Garrett, she'd met him some years ago and it was not a meeting she was likely to forget.

"Commodore, shall we get straight to the mission briefing?" Forthrightness was one of the few traits of Vulcans that the Captain appreciated. Varen walked through the door to the observation deck and the Captain followed.

"I'll have quarters allocated to yourself and the Commodore, Lieutenant," the First Officer informed Batanides. She nodded and turned her attention to the tactical station.

After a couple of minutes in conference, Captain Garrett emerged grim faced, followed by the Commodore. Whatever orders had been issued to the Captain during the brief exchange, it was clear they were not about to be discussed with the rest of the crew. Garrett looked visibly nervous and hung around behind the command chair, reluctant to take her place.

"Computer, initiate Protocol Varen-Omega, authorisation Varen-One-Six-Five-Omega," said Varen. At first nothing happened, then one by one several bridge stations blanked out or shut down completely. A number of officers found themselves sitting or standing in front of inoperative controls with nothing to do. "Those of you with disabled stations will now leave the bridge," ordered the Commodore. Half a dozen bridge crew made for the turbolifts, leaving only McLeran, Garrett, Varen, Batanides and Castillo. Lieutenant Castillo's helm controls, while not completely disabled, had been locked out, but unsure what he should do, he'd remained in his seat. He'd never heard of anything like this in any of his training.

With a single nod from the Commodore, Lieutenant Batanides walked the few steps to the now vacant navigation position, next to Castillo at the helm. The panel registered her touch-print and retina scan and reactivated the station. She quickly began entering commands and Castillo noticed that some of his own basic controls had now returned, though he was blind as far as the usual sensor feeds of the surrounding area went.

No one spoke until Batanides reported that she had set course and secured the console. Feeling as though her ship was being hijacked, Garrett gave Varen an enquiring glance.

"Do you intend to relieve me of command Commodore?"

"No Captain. I am simply ensuring that our movements are untraceable, either now or in the future. Our course and heading will not be displayed or recorded. Navigation will be locked subject to the security protocols encoded in the ship's systems." Castillo could tell Garrett was angry, but she was trying her best to restrain herself. Still, it seemed incredible that all these procedures could have been programmed into the Enterprise's systems, presumably when she'd been in space dock or maybe even before that. "All data regarding the mission and our location will be restricted." Varen explained.

"What about my crew Commodore, I can't run a ship with two people!" The Commodore strode over to the tactical station, ignoring the Captain's protests.

"You are in command of the ship, I have overall command of the mission." That made it clear enough to Castillo who he should be taking orders from at least.

5.

With no sensor readings to look at, navigational data to check or incoming or outgoing radio messages, the voyage, the duration and direction of which remained a mystery to most of the officers on the Bridge, was becoming extremely dull. In the six hours that followed their departure nobody had much to say. When a call from the Chief Engineer came through it was all the excuse Garrett needed to get away from the unbearable silence that pervaded the command deck. Giving up her seat to Commander McLeran, she left.

After stopping by at Engineering and trying to explain to Lieutenant Commander Cyrus why most of his systems had gone off-line, Garrett returned to her quarters. She dimmed the lights in her room and settled into her lounge chair. Looking out at the stars streaming past her window she tried to calm her mind. Her meditation had a purpose. She was visualising the ship's previous position and bearing. Then she replayed in her mind the turn it had made before entering warp and its speed, all of which she could remember precisely.

It had been a long time since she'd done any mental navigation calculations, but she hoped she hadn't lost the skill. Few humans possessed the innate ability to manipulate four-dimensional data, given that they had evolved in a three dimensional world, but somewhere in her genetic history, Garrett figured, some alien intermix had occurred. She was a little out of practice, Garrett had given up her monthly blind tri-d chess games when she'd taken command of the Enterprise, but soon it all came back to her. Garrett picked up a Padd and then remembered Varen's Omega protocols, no records could be kept of their mission. She would have to remember the results too.

Varen's orders, issued to her in their meeting when the Commodore had come aboard, had finally given her the information she'd been seeking all these years. The truth about the Enterprise-B. Though not in so many words, Varen's orders had convinced her that Lury and his ship were still out there somewhere. They were going on a mission to find him.


	2. Part II

**Part II: YESTERDAY'S ENTERPRISE**

6.

The Recreation Room was so full that Castillo couldn't find anywhere to sit. With the new protocols in effect many departments had been shut down. The Enterprise had gone from a multi-modal exploration vessel, to a ship with one single mission. Castillo walked past several small groups, looking for a free seat, and each one was talking about the situation that had developed over the last few hours. He was considering pulling rank on one of the enlisted crewmen to get a table when he noticed some of the other officers who had been expelled from the bridge. Carolina Daker, the Navigator who had been sitting next to him before the security protocols had been put in place, saw him and called him over to the bar.

Daker was only a little older than Castillo, but had already made it to Lieutenant Commander. She was tall, with short dark hair and a physique that showed her keen interest in every form of ship-board sports activity it was possible to take part in. Castillo liked her, but got the impression that she looked on him as something of a 'green' recruit, fresh out of the Academy. She persuaded someone on the seat next to her to move and Castillo sat down.

"I hope you're not going to ask me what happened after you left," he said.

"I know, you're sworn to secrecy," She smirked. "Maybe a few drinks will loosen you up." Daker waved at the bartender to get his attention.

"I doubt it, but I've got no objection to you trying." A glass of Rigellian beer duly arrived from Max the bartender.

"So who was that Vulcan?" Daker asked, "Can you at least tell me that?" Castillo grabbed the beer and took a couple of long gulps. So she wanted to know about Varen?

"The Commodore? Whoever he is, he's sure got the Captain wound up tight." Said Castillo.

"Does he have a name?" Said Daker, moving in a little closer.

"Sorry, didn't catch it. What theories has everyone else come up with?"

Daker began pointing around the room, where clumps of crew members were congregating.

"Palmer over there is sure it's top secret weapons trials. The security officers in that corner are arguing about whether it's a visit by Ambassador Spock, and most of the engineering staff think it has something to do with Romulans." Then someone shouted,

"Look, we just dropped out of warp!" Castillo looked out of the forward viewport to see the distorted streaking stars giving way to a new spectacle.

They were next to a dark swirling mass of gas and dust, deep red and purple. The names of known nebulae were then reeled off, but like the rumours of a few moments ago, all were dismissed for one reason or another.

Max came by to collect some empty glasses and said,

"I know where we are."

"How would you know?" Castillo asked.

"I haven't always been a bartender," said Max.

"So where are we?" Said Castillo. Instead of answering, Max looked over Castillo's shoulder and said,

"Good evening Lieutenant, what can I get you?" Castillo looked round to see Batanides standing behind him.

"What's going on here?" She said to Castillo and Daker. She sounded concerned.

"Well, with the lack of any real information about where we are or why, people are trying to fill in the blanks," Daker explained.

"Has anyone got it right yet?" Said Batanides, looking at Max.

"We're a long way from home boys and girls," said Max.

They saw the nebula getting closer and then the Enterprise came to a stop. Castillo wondered who was at the helm in his absence.

"Come on, we're wanted back on the Bridge," said Batanides.

"Me as well?" Said Daker hopefully.

"Sorry, somebody should have notified you," said Batanides. "Until further notice you're off duty." Daker pushed herself back from the bar and offered her barstool up to Batanides.

"Then I guess I'll have to go and practice my backhand swing some more. I'll see you later Castillo." Daker walked out of the Rec Room with another two lower ranking officers and Batanides and Castillo followed them into the corridor. Daker looked back and gave Castillo a smile and a playful little wave as she turned around a corner to go off to go in the direction of the sports hall.

"How much do you think they know?" Asked Batanides. Castillo was about to answer but then pulled himself up short. He felt there wasn't something quite right about revealing the details of his conversation with Daker, no matter how public it might have been. After all, he'd known Daker a lot longer than Batanides and there was a kind of unwritten rule about crew mates always sticking together. "I'm not just asking out of curiosity, I'm in charge of security for this mission and you're obliged to tell me everything." Batanides seemed pretty serious about this and he certainly didn't want to get on the wrong side of her or the Commodore.

"Like Daker said, everybody was just guessing, and then when we saw the nebula. It's only natural for people to be curious," Castillo offered, rather weakly.

"Maybe I'll have to confine all non-essential crew to quarters and have the viewports blanked out," Batanides said to herself. Castillo wondered whether she could be serious but then remembered what had happened on the Bridge and realised that under the circumstances nothing could surprise him.

7.

When Castillo and Batanides arrived on the Bridge, they saw Garrett, Varen and McLeran all crowded around the same science station. Castillo immediately went to check that Helm had been locked off correctly. It had, but it made him nervous to see his station unoccupied while the ship was in flight.

"Lieutenant Batanides," said Varen, "initiate the search routine. Captain, please take us into the nebula." Captain Garrett had obviously given up arguing with the Commodore by now, and took her seat.

"Helm, ahead one quarter impulse."

Castillo sat down at the helm controls and took the Enterprise slowly into the wall of gas in front of them. The boundary was almost imperceptible, but every set of instruments reacted to the new conditions and the helm started to feel sluggish and unresponsive.

"Shields down to twenty-percent," called Batanides from tactical. "All sensors and communications are being affected, attempting to compensate."

"Everything is as we anticipated," said Varen. "Begin the modifications."

"This is still my ship isn't it Commodore?" Garrett again protested. "Shall we do this properly?"

Varen said nothing, but looked at Batanides, who seemed to know instinctively that he wanted her to handle the Captain.

"Captain, we've studied this nebula quite extensively and we believe we can locate the object we're looking for."

"You mean the Enterprise-B?" Said Garrett, still trying to get a straight answer from one of them.

"We'll need to reconfigure the main deflector to emit a graviton particle beam," said Batanides, "with your permission of course Captain." Garrett looked to McLeran for his opinion.

"Shouldn't be a problem," he said, walking over to the Engineering console. "But it would help if I knew what we were trying to do." This time Varen fielded the question.

"The graviton beam will create a pulse which is tuned to the warp coils of the Enterprise-B. When it hits them they should resonate at the same frequency."

"Kind of like ringing a bell by firing sound waves at it," said McLeran.

"Make the necessary modifications Commander, but do not compromise the deflector's efficiency," said Garrett.

It took almost an hour to set up the graviton beam. McLeran hit the activation sequence and it shone out an invisible cone in front of them.

"Widen the search area," said Batanides.

"This nebula's over four light-years across, what makes you think the Enterprise will even be in range?" Said Garrett.

"In the time since its disappearance the vessel would only have been able to drift a relatively short distance," said Varen, without taking his eyes off the sensor readouts.

"Well good luck Commodore, I hope you don't have any plans for the next few months," said Garrett, though she remained in her seat despite her reservations.

There was another long pause when nobody said anything and they all stared intently at their own readouts.

"There!" said Batanides, "I saw something." Castillo cross checked his own sensor monitor.

"It's probably just our own reflection. A sensor ghost," he said. He'd seen readings like this before inside dense nebulas, they were like echo chambers for signals and subspace waves. The Captain, however was suddenly more optimistic.

"Oh, it's a ghost all right," said Garrett. "I'd recognise that warp signature anywhere." She had studied every tech manual and report from the Enterprise-B over the last two years. "Helm, steer us towards that signal." Castillo did as he'd been ordered and tried to peer into the thick soup of interference in front of them. The last thing he wanted to do was plough into anything that might be floating about, especially with the shields almost gone.

The signal varied as they steered first one way then the other. Eventually they got enough of a fix on the position of the signal to steer towards it, and the time delay between the pulse and the echo shortened, until they were almost on top of it.

"We can't be far off now, Helm all-stop!" Ordered Garrett. Castillo quickly brought the ship to a halt. McLeran shut off the graviton pulse and they all studied the sensors.

"There!" Said Batanides. "Right in front of us, about twenty-thousand metres."

"Manoeuvring thrusters Lieutenant," ordered the Captain, now on her feet and studying the main viewer, "take us in closer, nice and slow." Castillo worked the control system, like he was performing a docking manoeuvre, only he couldn't actually see what it was he was trying to move towards.

The viewscreen remained blank and if anything the nebula was more dense here than where they'd entered.

"Fifteen-thousand metres, something big and solid, it has to be the Enterprise," said Batanides. "Fourteen, thirteen," the ship crept forward with Castillo's hand nervously waiting over the reverse thrusters, ready to bring the Enterprise to an abrupt stop if he had to. Then, suddenly there was a ship in front of them. Castillo reacted, not waiting for the order from the Captain. He nulled their forward speed and tried to match velocity with the Enterprise-B, floating there so close off their bow that he felt like he could have opened up an emergency hatch and jumped across.

She was clearly a derelict. The Enterprise-B was spinning very slowly, end over end. They could see sections of the hull which were open to space, but no obvious markings on the hull to show that she'd been attacked.

"Full scan Lieutenant," said Varen. Batanides got to work immediately with a sequence of well rehearsed sensor sweeps. Everything went exactly as the simulations had predicted.

Garrett moved to the Science station and stood next to the Commodore.

"Very low energy readings, no evidence of any crew, alive or dead," she said. "What happened to them Varen? Can you at least tell the truth about that?"

"It is not necessary for you to know the details Captain Garrett, all that is required of you is to carry out your mission," said Varen, blankly.

"Well if I find out that Starfleet Intelligence is responsible for even one death on that ship you can be sure that I'll make it my mission to bring those responsible to account," said Garrett. She kept her voice low and measured, but the anger behind her words was obvious to everyone.

Batanides finished her scans and gave a nod to the Commodore. Varen appeared to consider Garrett's last remark for a moment and then said,

"We must transport over to the Enterprise-B and attempt to retrieve its mission data Captain. You may accompany us if you wish."

"You bet I will!" Said Garrett. "Commander McLeran, do we have transporter range?" McLeran checked the engineering status monitors.

"Barely, with all the interference we'll need to maintain less than ten-thousand kilometres."

"Good, have a shuttle standing by just in case. You have the Bridge Commander," said Garrett, making for the turbolift that Batanides and Varen had already boarded.

8.

Garrett, Batanides and Varen beamed directly onto the Bridge of the Enterprise-B. It was in total blackness and complete vacuum. They checked each other's suits and set their magnetic boots to hold them onto the deck. The pull of the spinning ship had collected every loose item in the deck into a scattered heap on and around the main viewer. Everything else was surprisingly intact.

"Looks like this section was blown when one of the emergency airlocks failed," said Batanides over the comm.

"That's not supposed to happen," said Garrett. She was trying to match everything she remembered about the old Enterprise to what she could now see. There was barely an inch of the ship she hadn't researched or studied in the years since its disappearance.

"Do we have access the main computer?" Asked Varen. Batanides walked over to one of the consoles and scanned the power couplings. "I doubt it. We have portable power, but there seems to be quite a lot of damage between here and the main core. Plus, I'm getting a lot of odd readings."

"The same pattern as in the message?" Said Varen.

"Possibly." Batanides replied. Garrett listened intently to this exchange, wondering what this new piece of information meant.

"Proceed to the primary computer core Lieutenant," said Varen. I will search the Bridge and the upper decks."

"I'd like to see the main Shuttlebay," said Garrett. Varen considered the request for a moment.

"Since you are not essential to our primary mission Captain, I will approve your request. Should you encounter any difficulties you are permitted to use your emergency transport device," he said. Garrett was reminded to check her own emergency transporter armband and saw its green light blinking away to tell her that it had locked onto the nearest functional transporter system.

"That's very kind of you Commodore," said Garrett, with mock gratitude that she knew Varen would mistake as genuine.

"This way Captain, we can climb down together," said Batanides from the jefferies tube at the rear of the deck.

The spinning ship reminded Garrett of those early Earth space stations, huge wheels which generated gravity through centrifugal force. She made good use of her zero-g training and had switched off her mag-boots allowing her to float along corridors and down turbolift shafts. Near the centre of the ship the rotation wasn't so much of a problem, but as she neared the aft sections she could feel the pull getting stronger.

By the time she was at the door to the Hangar Deck she found herself in an almost Martian gravity but the ceilings and floors were now walls and the walls were floors filled with obstructions and holes were the doors were. She re-engaged her boots and took a reading for the large compartment beyond the door. The main outer doors were open to space and the spin of the ship was pulling everything towards them. Once she was inside she walked carefully. She knew that one slip and she would be thrown out of the ship.

Garrett knew exactly what the shuttlecraft compliment for the Enterprise-B should have been, she even knew the name of every shuttle that was active at the time of its disappearance. Her hope had been to account for each one and work out whether Lury had escaped, but the open doors meant that almost everything inside the bay would now be missing.

One small sub-light shuttlepod remained, trapped against a bulkhead on one side of the deck, and over in the maintenance bays there were a couple of larger short-range warp shuttles. Neither of the long range shuttles were here, but they could have been lost on some previous expedition. Garrett began to wonder if there really had been any point to her coming over here, apart from annoying Varen.

Then she thought about checking the local command subprocessors, wondering if they'd been as badly damaged as the ones on the Bridge. She moved slowly along the deck, one step at a time until she was in the control booth. It was a little odd sitting at right angles to the room. All of the controls were now on the floor, but Garrett managed to get the computer up and running with the help of a little reserve power she'd found in a local back up battery. She was still puzzled why, if Lury really had abandoned the Enterprise, he hadn't destroyed it.

The computer readout sprang to life, but was filled with unrecognisable characters. Garrett tried running a diagnostic, but there wasn't an error, the computer really was running different software to what it was supposed to, or at least it was trying to. For odd moments the standard program appeared but then was buried again under the alien code. There appeared to be a war going on inside the system.

9.

The Crimson Blade was the flagship of the Ture family's fleet. It had once been the largest and most powerful ship of all the Parvol clans, but it was still only half the length of the smaller Enterprise. These Federation ships were impressive, at least they would be in the right hands, but Captain Blayc knew of the many weaknesses of their commanders. Their unwillingness to fire first, their unending compassion, all of which he could exploit if he had to. Blayc had been fighting all of his life and he'd beaten many opponents who were bigger and tougher than him, all it took was a little cunning.

Blayc considered his options. The larger Enterprise remained totally unaware of their presence and was stationary with its shields down. The other ship was a wreck and even more vulnerable. A couple of well place torpedoes would probably take it out completely, but the nebula presented another set of complications. The Chief had analysed the volatile gases present and warned that any explosions could set off a chain reaction.

The prospect of capturing the Enterprise NCC-1701-B and escaping was beyond their best hopes. It was clearly incapable of moving without extensive and time consuming repairs, but maybe the Federation people would fix it for him?

"Scan again," said Blayc to his Chief. "Only three on-board, you're sure?"

"Two Humans and one Vulcan," said the Chief. "They've split up now, one on the Bridge, one in the aft section and another in the middle."

Blayc had been waiting for a Federation ship to come here ever since he had found out about the abandoned Enterprise. He knew they would not risk leaving behind one of their most prized ships. He'd searched this nebula for months, to no avail, even risking mutiny from his crew and senior officers for his refusal to tell them what he'd been looking for. It had been such unbelievable good fortune that he had been close enough to the nebula when the the new Enterprise had arrived.

"Raiding parties are standing by Captain, should I give the order?" Said the Security Chief.

"Not yet Deresh." Blayc knew Deresh wanted a ship of his own, and worried that if he didn't get it soon he may decide to try and take the Blade from him, but they weren't Klingons, they were Parvol, and like their Cardassian cousins, they preferred more devious methods of removal.

"They're obviously not trying to repair it, they didn't send enough people over," said Daresh. "Whatever they want over there they'll probably take it then leave, unless we get to them first."

Blayc knew his Chief was very slowly beginning to work things out, but he still knew nothing of the real secrets held within the Enterprise-B. They were the real reason the Federation had come back here. The ship contained information that even Blayc dare not speak of. Information he must have.

"Beam Yurig and Kail into the Shuttlebay, I'll take care of the Vulcan myself."


	3. Part III

**PART III: CRIMSON BLADE**

10.

"Almost got it," said Batanides, through Varen's helmet communicator.

"Exercise caution Lieutenant, remember, there can be no mistakes." The main computer of the Enterprise-B had been affected by something that Commodore Varen had not even told Batanides about. It was not that he didn't trust her, she was a brilliant officer, one of the best he could find, but the less everyone knew about this mission, the less risk there would be.

"Yes Commodore. I'm finished down here, I'm making my way... Sir! Intruder Alert!"

Suddenly a group of five figures appeared in a circle around the Commodore. Varen could see they had disruptors trained on him before he had a chance to reach for his own weapon. Varen immediately recognised them as Parvol, a Cardassian off-shoot. They had been driven from their home world decades ago with the rise of the Cardassian Union's Military regime. Their race had been scattered across the surrounding sectors, many turning to piracy to survive. Varen supposed that this group may represent one such clan.

"Somehow," their leader said, "I expected more of a fight from a Starfleet crew." His mouth was curled into a mocking sneer.

"Since you have the superior number and firepower, a fight would be illogical," said Varen.

"I'm glad you see it that way Vulcan," said Blayc.

The Pirate wandered unsteadily around the Bridge, poking at the control panels and exposed subsystems.

"What is it that you want?" Asked Varen. "If you aim to capture this vessel then you should know that..."

"I don't," interrupted Blayc. "I have several of my own and all in a much better shape than this." He rounded the tactical station next to Varen and kept a firm grip on the railing, pulling himself up against the centrifugal forces pulling on everything at the extreme ends of the ship.

"What I want is this ship's navigation and command logs," said Blayc.

"I believe it would not be in your best interests to attain that information," Varen warned him.

"If you don't give them to me, I'll kill you and the other two people on board this ship, then take the information for myself. It's your choice but I'd prefer not to waste the time and your lives."

11

A disruptor blast hit the window of the control booth and shattered it, sending Garrett to the floor. She hadn't noticed the two aliens beam onto the deck, several metres away from the booth, until the last second, but they had certainly noticed her. Whoever they were was a mystery to Rachel Garrett, but they didn't seem to be friendly. Another blast hit the back of the booth, scarring the wall. Garrett lost her grip on the palm beacon she'd been using to illuminate the room and it skittered away through the open door, following a trajectory that would inevitably lead it out of the open shuttlebay doors.

There was a pause in the attack, perhaps her assailants were re-positioning themselves. Garrett looked out at the nearest shuttlepod, a small utility vehicle. It was some way off, still attached to the deck by its magnetic clamps, but that deck was now a wall thanks to the lack of an active gravity system and the spinning of the ship. Garrett considered the path of the beacon and made some mental calculations.

She spotted one of the raiders moving along the wall opposite, trying to outflank her. Garrett couldn't find her own phaser, it must have come away from her belt and dropped off somewhere when she was attacked. She wedged herself into the corner of the booth and switched off her magnetic boots. Another shot came in, but Garrett launched herself away, out of the door. She flew across the room, bounced off the deck and then reached the shuttle. She grabbed the access door and pulled herself inside.

The assailants were now both on the wrong side of the shuttlepod to be able to see her. They fired into the side of the shuttle, but its hull plating was resistant to small arms fire. One of them tried to perform the same stunt as Garrett, switching off his own magboots. He jumped and floated up to the shuttle but he had misjudged the distance. He went past it before the forces of the spinning Enterprise took over and pulled him in the one direction he didn't want to go, out toward the hanger doors and into open space.

Garrett allowed herself a smile at the sight of one of the intruders leaving the deck, but she still had the other one to deal with. He had kept his magboots firmly fixed to the deck and was closing in on her the slow way. The Captain tried to start the shuttle's engines, but the main fusion power generator would take several minutes to warm up. Instead, she would have to run the necessary systems from the on-board power cells, which she hoped hadn't lost too much of their charge during the last four years.

To her great relief the craft powered up. Garrett released the docking clamps and the shuttle moved forward, towards her attacker. He fired at the shuttle but the damage was no more than cosmetic. Captain Garrett dare not fire the weapons for fear of draining the already low power reserves of the craft, so instead she decided to give the alien something else to worry about. She opened up the aft thrusters and lurched at him. He hadn't expected such reckless behaviour from a Starfleet Captain, but didn't have time to worry about the motives and reasoning of it. He slammed himself flat against the deck just as the shuttle reached him, missing him by millimetres.

Garrett had to make a tight turn to avoid the opposite wall of the hangar deck, but managed to line herself up with the main doors. Without main power the shuttle was difficult to control. She'd almost made it out of the bay when a parting shot from the guy she'd just tried to run down struck the shuttle's aft port thruster. This set the craft spinning wildly and Garrett was again the victim of physical forces. Pressed against the side of the cockpit she tried to activate the inertial dampening field, but her arm could hardly move. There was no way to reach the thruster controls either. In a last desperate act Garrett grabbed the emergency transporter armband on her suit and in less than a second she had disappeared.

12.

Varen did not doubt the Parvol pirate's conviction, he knew would kill for the information in the computer if Varen didn't give it to him, but he almost certainly didn't know the full story of Captain Lury's last message. Varen had managed to keep that a secret.

"How do you intend to proceed?" Said Commodore Varen. Blayc pulled a small computer device from his pocket and handed it to the Vulcan.

"Load the information onto here, and no tricks. I'll know if you've tampered with the data."

Lieutenant Batanides emerged from the Jefferies tube onto the Bridge with more of the pirates behind her.

"The Lieutenant is my computer technician, she will be more capable of fulfilling you request," said Varen. He handed the device to her. Batanides went to the one computer console that Varen had previously powered up and connected it to Blayc's device. She cleared all of the local logs and nav data for transfer, then deactivated the security measures and encryption, all under the watchful gaze of Blayc.

"Are you sure you want me to do this Commodore?" She asked.

"Do it, or your Commodore dies!" Insisted Blayc, as one of his men raised a disruptor rifle to Varen's helmet. Batanides sent the command to download the information.

"How do I know you'll let us go when I've done what you ask?" Said Batanides.

"You don't," said Blayc. He waited for the device to show that the transfer was complete then he snatched it from the console.

Blayc's raiding party backed up into a tight circle, still covering the two Starfleet officers, then at some unseen signal their transporter beams took them silently away.

"We have to tell the Enterprise, there's still time to stop them," Said Batanides.

"Based on what I saw of their technology, they will not get far."

"Where's Captain Garrett?" Said Batanides.

"She has not yet reported in," said Varen. "Varen to Enterprise, beam the boarding party back."

13.

Varen and Batanides reappeared moments later in the transporter room of the Enterprise-C. Both officers took off their helmets and breathed in the familiar air before saying anything. Batanides proudly displayed her tricorder to the Commodore.

"At least I was able to keep this hidden from Blayc and his crew." Varen turned to the Transporter Chief.

"Has Captain Garrett returned?"

"The Captain, no sir, she wasn't picked up by the transporter, I couldn't locate her," the Chief reported.

"Varen to Bridge, scan the Enterprise-B for Captain Garrett's comm signal," the Commodore ordered. The pair struggled out of their vacuum suits.

By the time they had reached the bridge Commander McLeran had scanned the old Enterprise twice, as well as the surrounding area.

"I can't find her anywhere sir, I even tried an internal scan to see if she somehow made it back here. There was phaser fire detected in the shuttlebay where she last seen." Commodore Varen gave it some thought.

"Commander McLeran, you are now in command," he said.

"With respect sir, I don't think we should give up on the Captain so quickly. We should send over a search party."

"There is no time Commander. There are hostile forces in the vicinity, you must destroy the Enterprise-B immediately." There was a long pause, then McLeran said,

"I won't carry out any action that will jeopardise my Captain sir, not until I've done everything I can to..."

"With your permission Commander," Batanides had taken a position at the tactical station and she was already arming a torpedo.

"It is vital that we do not delay any further Commander, you will give the order to fire."

"All our scans indicate the Captain's not on board the Enterprise-B sir," said Castillo. "If she was over there we'd be able to find her, even from the energy signature of her suit." McLeran considered his situation very carefully and then gave the order.

"Lieutenant Batanides, Fire"

The torpedo streaked out from the Enterprise-C and met its target. It tore through several layers of the Enterprise-B's weakened hull before exploding. A great orange and white burst ejected debris out of the aft part of the saucer section and triggered multiple secondary explosions along the hull. Then a streak of fire caught the volatile gases in the nebula and they too began to burn. The once proud ship broke into two pieces and was engulfed by a cloud of fire as the nebula caught light.

"Shields up!" McLeran ordered, though Batanides had already raised them as a precaution. "Helm, get us out of here, maximum impulse."

They turned and the wall of debris hit their shields. What was left of the Enterprise-B streaked past them as the fireball behind expanded. Then, a new shape emerged from out of the firestorm. At first it was just a shadow of shifting shapes, then it coalesced into a ship. It was the pirate vessel.

"Scanning Captain," said Batanides, "looks like they got hit, their cloaking device has failed. They're raising shields. The vessel's configuration is consistent with computer records for a ship known as the Crimson Blade, a pirate vessel wanted in connection with a number of raids along the Federation border."

"Helm, move around to attack them," said McLeran.

"No Commander, we must not delay. We'll let the nebula will take care of them," said Varen.


End file.
